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The domain name news is supported by auDA. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ European registrars gain new tool to fight spam (IDG) http://infoworld.com/article/07/01/18/HNeurofightspam_1.html The Fragile Network by Bill Thompson http://www.circleid.com/posts/the_fragile_network/ ICANN hires critic McCarthy http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/technology/archives/2007/01/18/icann_hires_critic_mccarthy.html ICANN Releases Annual Report for 2005-2006 http://icann.org/announcements/announcement-19jan07.htm Tennis Australia faces investigation on net deal http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2007/01/21/1169330765661.html Indian Domain Name Forum Launched http://www.tophosts.com/articles/004513.html ********************** DOMAIN NAMES ********************** European registrars gain new tool to fight spam (IDG) Under a new rule that will come into force next month, European registrars for the ".eu" domain will be able to immediately stop the transfer of ownership of a domain name if it's suspected of abuse. http://infoworld.com/article/07/01/18/HNeurofightspam_1.html http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,128568-pg,1/article.html http://www.techworld.com/applications/news/index.cfm?newsID=7801 Introducing the .eu registrar Code of Conduct (news release) Eurid, the registry for .eu, has drawn up a code of conduct for its accredited registrars which is to made effective within the next couple of months. The Code is to be administered by a board of representatives elected from within the .eu registrar community. http://www.eurid.eu/en/general/news/introducing-the-eu-registrar-code-of-conduct The Fragile Network by Bill Thompson One of the more persistent founding myths around the internet is that it was designed to be able to withstand a nuclear war, built by the US military to ensure that even after the bombs had fallen there would still be communications between surviving military bases. It isn't true, of course. http://www.circleid.com/posts/the_fragile_network/ ICANN hires critic McCarthy Back in July, we reported here that regular Technology Guardian contributor Kieren McCarthy was standing for membership of the ICANN board - in order "to make the ICANN community realise that you can ultimately achieve more by being open". Well, it seems he got part of the way there. Following recent movements via his blog, Kieren's obviously been getting involved in some work with the group, which basically runs the internet. http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/technology/archives/2007/01/18/icann_hires_critic_mccarthy.html ICANN Releases Annual Report for 2005-2006 ICANN is pleased to provide its first annual report in accordance with its commitments established under the Joint Project Agreement signed in September 2006. As part of ICANN's commitment to greater transparency and accessibility, we have posted this annual report for review and established two means to facilitate public comment. The first is a forum for the community to submit comments and suggestions. The second is a new blog on the ICANN website that allows members of the community to exchange their views about the report. http://icann.org/announcements/announcement-19jan07.htm Tennis Australia faces investigation on net deal Tennis Australia has paid a "hefty amount" to a so-called cybersquatter to buy the tennis.com.au internet domain but it may have done so illegally. http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2007/01/21/1169330765661.html Indian Domain Name Forum Launched A new forum has been launched, INForum.in, allowing people to discuss, learn about and trade Indian domain names. http://www.tophosts.com/articles/004513.html Maran for Indian Internet content Internet, like television or newspapers, should have more local content for better penetration and adoption by the masses, Communications and Information Technology Minister Dayanidhi Maran said in New Delhi. ... "We will soon launch internationalised domain names in the Indian languages including Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam and others, enabling local language domain names at the secondary level" Maran said. http://www.zdnetindia.com/news/communication/stories/168542.html http://www.techtree.com/India/News/Maran_Wants_Local_Content_on_Internet/551-78625-613.html http://www.rxpgnews.com/business/Maran-for-Indian-Internet-content_12337.shtml us: Obama domain is taken Political junkies may have noticed the October debut of a new blog on Sen. Barack Obama's possible run for the presidency. If you log onto www.obama2008.org, you'll get there. But those same political junkies may be surprised when they learn who owns the site. http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/beaconnews/news/221960,2_1_AU21_OBAMAWEB_S1.article Internet boss pays large sum for .uk domain UKFast announces its success in a private bidding war for one of the IT industry's hottest domain names: servers.co.uk, paying GBP40K. http://www.manufacturingtalk.com/news/ukf/ukf125.html Domain Names as a Competitive Advantage When Russian Standard Vodka purchased Vodka.com for $3M last year, lay people gasped at such an outrageous sum. But domainers simply thought, now theres a company that gets it. Russian Standard understands that owning the domain name will give it a competitive advantage in the crowded vodka space and will give the brand instant international credibility. http://domainnamewire.com/2007/01/17/domain-names-as-a-competitive-advantage/ Call for Nominations to the Public Interest Registry .ORG Advisory Council Interested individuals are encouraged to submit nominations, including self-nominations. A nomination statement of approximately 400 words should include details of the nominees experience with the Internet, commitment to promoting the noncommercial use of the Internet, understanding of the technical or policy issues facing the .ORG registry, and perspectives regarding the needs of the .ORG community. A current biography and digital photograph also are requested. http://www.circleid.com/posts/pir_public_interest_registry_org_advisory_council/ RIPE NCC Accepting Requests for 32-bit Autonomous System Numbers We are pleased to announce that on 1 January 2007, the RIPE NCC began accepting requests for 4-byte (32-bit) Autonomous System Numbers. Assignments come from the range: 3.0 - 3.1023. http://ripe.net/news/asn32.html RIR Comparative Policy Overview The goal of this document is to provide a comparative overview of policies across the Regional Internet Registry (RIR) system. It is not a policy statement by the RIRs, but serves as a reference for the Internet community. http://nro.net/documents/nro43.html Nominet DRS consultation event (news release) We would like to invite you to a morning reception, to discuss the current Dispute Resolution Service consultation. Registration will be from 10.30am and the event will commence at 11.00am and finish at 12.30pm. Nominet has Sarah Montague of BBC's Today, Newsnight and HARDtalk as our Panel Moderator. Sarah will be joined by representatives from the IP community, the domainer community, the DRS experts and a small business representative who has been through the DRS system recently. We hope this will make for an interesting panel, covering a variety of expertise and opinions. http://www.nominet.org.uk/news/latest/?contentId=3519 Nominet Registrant satisfaction survey results (news release) Nominet conducted their third registrant satisfaction survey in August 2006 and the results of this are now available. Nominet reports they received an overall customer satisfaction index rating of 84.3%, which is an increase of 3.1% when compared with our previous survey conducted in November 2005 and an increase of 4.3% when compared to our first survey in March/April 2005. http://www.nominet.org.uk/news/latest/?contentId=3494 Moniker Auction Sells $2M in Domains The holy grail of domain name sales is reaching the end user, not other domain investors. And thats exactly what Moniker did at this weeks Internext conference in Las Vegas. I should note that the end user group Moniker reached was the adult entertainment business. Because this is a family-friendly site, Im not going to list some of the sales. But top honors go to Shemale.com, which sold for $520,000. Here are some of the non-inflammatory domains that sold: Opportunity.com $150,000; Censored.com $58,500; EmergencyClinic.com $11,000; FuneralParlor.com $7,000; Inherited.com $6,100; MaritalAids.com $6,000; Opposites.com $6,000; Blondes.org $5,500; PrescriptionDrugPlans.com $5,000; ProfessionalAthletes.com $3,100; and Bartab.com $1,500. http://domainnamewire.com/2007/01/18/moniker-auction-sells-2m-in-domains/ The VoIP Peering PuzzlePart 11: VeriSign ENUM Data Access Service If you have sent an e-mail to a user with a .com or .net domain suffix recently, you have been interacting with address processing technology from VeriSign, Inc. The Mountain View, California-based company has a daily workload that is on the verge of mind-boggling: authoritative routing support for every web address ending with .com or .net, as many as 18 billion Domain Name System (DNS) queries every day; daily delivery of 100 million mobile-originated intercarrier SMS messagesplus over 600,000 multimedia messages; delivery of over 4.5 million ringtones, pictures, videos, and games to mobile telephone customers every day; monitoring 300 million retail transactions; and delivering over 150 million headline links. This adds up to quite a portfolio of accomplishments for a firm that was only founded in 1995, but has since grown to include 4,000 employees and, in 2005, boasted revenues of $1.66 billon. http://www.voipplanet.com/backgrounders/article.php/3654666 Why do domains cost so much money? (blog) Now, $8 or $9 per year is not bad at all compared to what they used to cost. But, why do these companies charge so much for so little? Also, Im not talking about those registrars with hosting available or anything, but for people like me- I buy the domain and within minutes its loaded onto a server. http://timefornerds.com/2007/01/18/why-do-domains-cost-so-much-money/ '.XXX' Domain Name Under Consideration Again The organization in charge of approving Internet domains has reintroduced a controversial proposal to create a domain registry specifically for pornographic content. http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewCulture.asp?Page=/Culture/archive/200701/CUL20070119a.html http://www.pipelinenews.org/bbs/viewpost.cfm?particleid=378&year=2007 Push Resumes for New Domain for Internet Pornography Efforts to create a .xxx domain name for pornographic websites have resumed, and conservative leaders are urging citizens to speak out against the proposal while the agency in charge is taking public comments through Feb. 5. http://www.lifeway.com/lwc/article_main_page/0%2C1703%2CA%25253D164721%252526M%25253D200725%2C00.html *************** RESEARCH PAPERS *************** Censorship by Proxy: The First Amendment, Internet Intermediaries, and the Problem of the Weakest Link by Seth F. Kreimer (University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Nov 2006) The rise of the Internet has changed the First Amendment drama, for governments confront technical and political obstacles to sanctioning either speakers or listeners in cyberspace. Faced with these challenges, regulators have fallen back on alternatives, predicated on the fact that, in contrast to the usual free expression scenario, the Internet is not dyadic. The Internets resistance to direct regulation of speakers and listeners rests on a complex chain of connections, and emerging regulatory mechanisms have begun to focus on the weak links in that chain. Rather than attacking speakers or listeners directly, governments have sought to enlist private actors within the chain as proxy censors to control the flow of information. http://www.pennumbra.com/issues/article.php?atid=109 Elephants and Mice Revisited: Law and Choice of Law on the Internet by Peter P. Swire (University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Jun 2005) This Article seeks to explain those mysterious mechanisms. It does not primarily address the prescriptive task of saying what the optimal rules should be for resolving conflicting national laws that affect the Internet. Instead, it takes on a descriptive task. It treats choice of law on the Internet as a dependent variable; the task is to explain when and how choice-of-law rules actually matter on the Internet. That choice-of-law question, in turn, overlaps considerably with the even broader questionwhen and how does any rule of law actually matter on the Internet? http://www.pennumbra.com/issues/article.php?atid=58 Technology and Internet Jurisdiction by Joel R. Reidenberg (University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Jun 2005) This Essay argues that the initial wave of cases seeking to deny jurisdiction, choice of law, and enforcement to states where users and victims are located constitutes a type of denial-of-service attack against the legal system. Internet separatists use technology-based arguments to deny the existence of sufficient contacts for jurisdiction and the applicability of rules of law interdicting certain behavior. From this perspective, the attackers seek to disable states from protecting their citizens online. The Essay next shows that innovations in information technology will undermine the technological assault on state jurisdiction. This counterintuitive effect is born out of the fact that more sophisticated computing enlists the processing capabilities and power of users computers. This interactivity gives the victims state a greater nexus with offending acts and provides a direct relationship with the offender for purposes of personal jurisdiction and choice of law. Some of these same innovations also enable states to enforce their decisions electronically and consequently bypass the problems of foreign recognition and enforcement of judgments. Finally, the Essay argues that the exercise of state power through assertions of jurisdiction can and should be used to advance the development of more granular technologies and new service markets for legal compliance. Technologies should be available to enable Internet participants to respect the rule of law in states where their Internet activities reach. Assertions of state jurisdiction and electronic enforcement are likely to advance this public policy. http://www.pennumbra.com/issues/article.php?atid=57 ******************** OTHER INTERNET NEWS ******************** Web conduct code to be drawn up Technology companies Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and Vodafone are in talks with human rights and press freedom groups to draw up an internet code of conduct to protect free speech and privacy of Web users. http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/488120/964230 http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/8777/53/ Companies, Groups Address Global Civil Liberties Challenges (news release) CDT has joined with a broad group of companies, investors, academics, and human rights groups to address the free expression and privacy challenges facing companies that do business internationally. That process -- which aims to produce a set of principles guiding company behavior when faced with laws, regulations and policies that interfere with the achievement of human rights -- marks a new phase in efforts that the groups began in 2006. The joint process represents the merging of several concurrent efforts by companies, academics and public interest advocates to address the issues. One of those efforts was a series of consultations coordinated by CDT last year. http://www.cdt.org/press/20070118press-humanrights.php MySpace is sued over child safety MySpace is being sued by the families of five teenage girls who it is claimed were sexually assaulted by men they met through the social networking website. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6277633.stm http://technology.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,1994438,00.html http://iht.com/articles/2007/01/18/business/techbrief.php http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/18/myspace_sued/ us: MySpace sued over sex predators Four families have sued News Corp. and its MySpace social-networking site after their underage daughters were sexually abused by adults they met on the site, lawyers for the families said. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/01/19/1169095944765.html After Microsoft and Google, Belgian editors go after Yahoo After taking action against Microsoft and Google, Belgium's French-speaking newspapers are seeking redress from another Internet search engine, Yahoo, their lawyer has said. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/01/18/1169095915054.html http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BELGIUM_YAHOO http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-6151609.html Belgian Newspapers to Challenge Yahoo Over Copyright Issues A group of Belgian newspapers has asked Yahoo to remove links to their archived stories from its Web search service, claiming they infringe copyright laws, their lawyers confirmed Friday. The move follows a legal challenge by the group against Google that has seen Belgian newspaper content stripped from Google News pending a court ruling expected early this year. http://ecommercetimes.com/story/55249.html us: Feds offer cybercrime tips to local cops Police trying to learn how to use the Internet to investigate everything from cyberstalking to spam and illegal hacking have some new advice, thanks to the U.S. Department of Justice. http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-6150676.html us: Pa. Court Withdraws Holding on Internet Viewing of Child Porn The Superior Court of Pennsylvania has withdrawn its recent first-impression holding that merely to look at child pornography on the Internet -- without intentionally saving or downloading any images viewed -- does not amount to "knowing possession" of child pornography as proscribed under state law. The court also granted a prosecution request for an en banc re-argument. http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1168941736750 US court withdraws 'legal child porn' opinion A US court has withdrawn its controversial recent opinion that viewing child pornography is legal as long as it is not intentionally saved. The judge had said there was ambiguity in the law over what constitutes "knowing possession" of material. http://out-law.com/page-7677 eu: Storm chaos prompts virus surge Experts say they are surprised how quickly computer virus writers take advantage of the European storms http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6278079.stm uk: Cyber-bullying affecting 17% of teachers, poll finds Nearly one-fifth of teachers are being bullied by mobile phone, email or over the internet, a new survey on cyber-bullying has revealed. http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,,1994403,00.html au: Net nasties on the rise International crime gangs are ready to tap our phone calls in the latest scam to hit the internet. Online fraud is now a multi-billion global criminal enterprise. Australian companies are spending billions of dollars a year to combat it. A special investigation has revealed a sophisticated array of new threats to internet users. http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,21095165-661,00.html se: Bank loses US$1.1m to online fraud Internet fraudsters have stolen around 8m kronor (US$1.1m) from account holders at Swedish bank Nordea. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6279561.stm http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39285547,00.htm Website offers whistleblowers chance to go global The internet could become even more difficult for governments to regulate with a new website, Wikileaks, promising to provide a safe haven for whistleblowers to upload confidential documents. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/01/19/1169095977590.html Beijing Olympic officials not amused by online pranks (Reuters) Beijing Games organizers have threatened legal action against online pranksters who poke fun at official Olympic symbols after a rash of digital spoofs appeared on the Internet. http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-6151025.html nl: Dutch prosecutors ask for jail terms for botnet gang Dutch prosecutors are pursuing jail terms for two men charged in a large-scale computer hacking scheme in which more than 1 million computers may have been infected with adware and other malicious programs. http://computerworld.co.nz/news.nsf/news/DBE9FE733202F02DCC2572670071FDA9 eu: CONFERENCE: Broadband Gap 2007 The Information Society offers enormous benefits to Europe's less developed regions and rural and isolated areas, yet commercial investment in broadband infrastructure for these areas is problematic. Launched by four European Commissioners, this Conference and Exhibition will investigate how the strategic use of ICT can support regional and local development, ease infrastructure and geographical handicaps and make these areas more attractive to business and individuals alike. http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/events/broadband_gap_2007/index_en.htm eu: Is a communications collapse possible in Europe? (news release) The European Commission is seeking feedback on how best to safeguard our electronic networks against disruption from attack or natural hazards. This follows today's public presentation of the findings of a study which identifies a range of important issues for ensuring that our future networks are sufficiently protected and resilient. As the services and processes that they support become increasingly interconnected and interdependent, the consequences of the failure of or criminal attack on a single network or sub-system could potentially be propagated more widely and faster than ever before. Protective measures need to be put in place to ensure that critical services and infrastructure are not vulnerable to such failures, and that there can be no "domino effect" that might otherwise result in a major technological collapse of communications and the many services they support. http://www.europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/07/59&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en us: Cybercrime Treaty: Is It Effective Law Enforcement Or An Affront To U.S. Sovereignty? The U.S. Senate recently approved an international treaty designed to combat computer crime. The treaty has been touted by Senate leaders as enhancing the U.S. ability to cooperate with foreign governments in fighting terrorism, computer hacking, money laundering and child pornography, among other crimes. However, a detailed review of the treaty reveals that it is largely symbolic, because U.S. law already includes much of what the treaty requires. http://www.localtechwire.com/business/local_tech_wire/biotech/story/1168048/ Pakistanis like Indian porn Pakistanis are most inclined towards Indian porn, entertainment and 'masala' websites on the Internet, the rating website Alexa said. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS/World/Pakistan/Pakistanis_like_Indian_porn/articleshow/1319852.cms http://www.newkerala.com/news4.php?action=fullnews&id=82594 Big Medias Crush on Social Networking With a wink and a flirt, big media companies have developed a full-bore teenage crush on social networking businesses. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/21/business/yourmoney/21frenzy.html Meet Grace, she'll be running your home: Computers in Microsoft house of the future will suggest recipes and offer fashion tips The door to the future is unexpectedly plain, a bare wood surface indistinguishable from thousands of others in Microsoft's functional headquarters. It gives no clue to the flights of fancy hidden inside. Step through it and you are immersed in a world of virtual wallpaper, intelligent fridges, talking recipe books, wardrobes that dispense fashion advice and the entire human catalogue of art, film and literature on demand. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,1995392,00.html sg: Digital divide between homes in public and private estates narrows The digital divide between income groups in Singapore has narrowed, according to the 2006 household survey conducted by the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA). http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/253322/1/.html Lobby group tells ISPs to cut off customers As illegal file-sharing eats into its battered revenues, the music industry is taking its anti-piracy fight to the world's major internet service providers. Big names such as BT, Tiscali and NTL will be in the sights of global lobby group IFPI as it urges them to disconnect customers who share music illegally or else face government rules. http://technology.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,1993045,00.html http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/music-industry-declares-war-internet/story.aspx?guid={0D43D22C-F418-4947-95AE-82A44A2B55DB} Google, Service Providers and the Future of P2P In a non-operational NANOG discussion about Google bandwidth uses, several statements were made. It all started from the following post by Mark Boolootian: "Cringley has a theory and it involves Google, video, and oversubscribed backbones..." The following comment has to be one of the most important comments in the entire article and its a bit disturbing. http://www.circleid.com/posts/google_service_providers_and_the_future_of_p2p/ Indie labels sign MySpace deal International independent music labels have grouped together in a deal that enables them to start selling tunes on MySpace, the social networking website owned by Rupert Murdochs News Corporation. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/ca8c1e42-a980-11db-9185-0000779e2340.html Father of internet warns against Net Neutrality Robert Kahn, the most senior figure in the development of the internet, has delivered a strong warning against "Net Neutrality" legislation. Speaking to an audience at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California at an event held in his honour, Kahn warned against legislation that inhibited experimentation and innovation where it was needed. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/18/kahn_net_neutrality_warning/ Peaks, valleys and vistas: Microsoft The launch of a new version of Microsoft Windows, called Vista, is not quite the event it used to be. Has the software giant reached the pinnacle of its power? http://economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8550569 An end to that blue screen of death? Microsoft's latest upgrades should make PC users happier (AFP) IT IS an old chestnut, but a telling one: if carmakers built vehicles as Microsoft produces software, they would come in only one colour, the dashboard would be incomprehensible and they would crash a lot. Microsoft's latest products mean that its users should no longer double as crash-test dummies. http://economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8550580 in: Google and Microsoft plan data centres The internet arms race between Google and Microsoft took a new twist as the companies announced plans to spend more than $1bn between them on new data centres to handle future rapid growth in online traffic. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/d4b5a41a-a818-11db-b448-0000779e2340.html Digital archivists look to porn, Flash for tips How can society preserve digital art on the Internet the way brick-and-mortar museums can for Picassos and van Goghs? Oddly enough, at least one preservationist believes the answer might be found in an expression that most curators don't consider art--online pornography. http://www.zdnetindia.com/news/communication/stories/168648.html ITU: Voice Revenues in the Telecommunications The ITU workshop The Future of Voice held on the 15th and 16th of January 2007 in Geneva, Switzerland looked, inter alia, at the voice traffic and revenue trends in the last fifteen years. On the global level, local and national long-distance reported telephone minutes per capita were growing in the 1990s and stably falling since the beginning of the new decade. A notable exception of the general rule is the US experiencing continuous growth in the number of local minutes: in 15 years, the number of local minutes per capita has grown four-fold. The international outgoing traffic grew significantly over the last fifteen years: in the Republic of Korea, in 2005 it was 15 times more intensive than in 1990, in the US five times. Even though, since the beginning of the new century, the international voice traffic tends to slowly decrease. http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/newslog/Voice+Revenues+In+The+Telecommunications+.aspx +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Sources include Quicklinks <http://qlinks.net/> and BNA Internet Law News <http://www.bna.com/ilaw/>. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ (c) David Goldstein 2006 --------- David Goldstein address: 4/3 Abbott Street COOGEE NSW 2034 AUSTRALIA email: Goldstein_David @yahoo.com.au phone: +61 418 228 605 (mobile); +61 2 9665 5773 (home) "Every time you use fossil fuels, you're adding to the problem. Every time you forgo fossil fuels, you're being part of the solution" - Dr Tim Flannery Send instant messages to your online friends http://au.messenger.yahoo.com --------------------------------------------------------------------------- List policy, unsubscribing and archives => http://dotau.org/
